Ganis said seeing Goodell and Ryan involved is a sign the league, the Bears and the state are serious about finding every possible avenue for a project that would keep the team in Illinois, but also said that the presence of those decisionmakers also puts pressure on Illinois.
“They have the entire senior leadership of the NFL that’s involved in stadium projects involved. The head of government affairs, the head of team business operations. The absolute top people in the world are working on this now,” he said. “There are no more excuses. If Illinois doesn’t come through, it’s all on Illinois.”
The upcoming veto session in Springfield will take place after the election and will end on December 3, and the expectation is that a deal for a Bears stadium project in Illinois would have to come together before the end of that session in order to prevent the team from departing to Indiana.
Ernie Rose, who represents Touchdown Arlington, a grassroots group of business owners interested in bringing the Bears to Arlington Heights, says the inclusion of language that could open the door for Chicago as a Bears stadium option could be crucial in attracting support of skeptical lawmakers who didn’t want to pave the way for the team to move only to the suburbs.
“The stadium authority bill gives Chicago a chance to make their best pitch too,” he said. “And it was clear that the log jam in the last session was they couldn’t give votes from Chicago.”
